Magazine Ranks Mugabe worst dictator

President Mugabe was ranked in sixth position last year by the same magazine.

North Korean leader Kim Joing-11 is third this year one position behind Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir who came second.

Parade is the Washington Post’s weekend magazine and the results of this year’s survey were carried in this week’s Sunday edition.

Parade selects the list after analyzing their human rights abuses and the intensity of their absolute power based on data from the United States State Department, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and from information supplied by Reporters Without Borders.

The magazine said since assuming power in 1980, Mugabe had exercised iron rule on the country and has ruined the economy, pushing up the rate of unemployment rate to more than 85 percent.

Zimbabwe has an atrocious record on the media with the country holding the record for the most repressive medial laws in the world.

Al-Bashir (65) came second for his leading role in the massacres in the Darfur region of Sudan a role that has seen the International Criminal Court issuing an arrest warrant for him.

In fourth place is Burmese junta leader Than Shwe (76) who has been denounced by the international community for delaying access of relief workers to flood-devastated areas in May last year, when 140 000 people were killed or went missing and more than 2 million people were displaced in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis.

Saudi King Abdullah (85), who ranked fourth in 2008, was ranked fifth this year.

Chinese President Hu Jintao (66) ranks sixth this year, down from fifth in 2008.

Jintao is accused for restricting freedom of the press and religion and suppressing ethnic minorities including the Tibetans.